More details emerge on GTA 6 leak: Phishing scam targeted Rockstar India employee, revealing major 'Vice Beach' development plans

Following what turned out to be the biggest gaming leak of this decade so far — the 2022 Grand Theft Auto 6 hack — some additional details have surfaced regarding how the hacker managed to breach Rockstar Games' security.

According to a recent post by the X (formerly known as Twitter) account @morsmutual_, it appears the individual responsible for leaking content, known as Arion, tricked an employee at Rockstar India through an email phishing scam while the employee was working remotely. The phishing attack led to the hacker gaining access to the employee’s browser data, which then opened a way for him to gain access to Rockstar’s internal Slack channel. What happened next reportedly cost the company millions of dollars — five million to be precise.  The hacker gained access to sensitive files, including those related to the highly anticipated GTA 6.

This leak, which included around 90 video clips of early GTA 6 gameplay, was one for the books. The breach gave the public a first look at the game's setting, including "Vice Beach" — reminiscent of GTA Vice City, the wildly popular installment from 2002. Arion also reportedly accessed GTA 6 source code, following which, law enforcement arrested the hacker. He was identified as a 17-year-old guy from the UK, and has since been remanded to juvenile detention.

The source further revealed that Rockstar India had been assigned a significant part of the project, namely the development of the “Vice Beach” area, which is expected to be a major part of the new game’s map. If one single regional branch was involved in designing merely one key section of the map, it's crazy to think how massive the scale of GTA 6 could be, especially considering that Rockstar India is a crucial contributor to the map design. Rockstar India's internal studio in Bengaluru, officially established in 2016, has been involved in several high-profile games in the past as well, including contributions to Red Dead Redemption 2 — one of the studio's most acclaimed games.

This information demonstrates the substantial likelihood of vulnerability exploitation in remote work environments, and illustrates how a simple phishing scam can compromise even a major studio such as Rockstar. While Rockstar has since made efforts to contain the fallout from the leak, like releasing an official trailer for the game on December 4, 2023, it remains to see if any major developments in the future affect the release date of GTA 6.

In the meanwhile, take a look at this recent document that encapsulates almost all available information regarding the game up and until this point.